What The 49ers Should Have Learned From The McDonald Case. Plus, Harbaugh Hints He Will “Educate” And “Advise” Players About Future Large House Parties.

At last. The Ray McDonald case has come to a conclusion — or at least to as much of a conclusion as we could probably expect.

What’s far more important from this point forward: If the 49ers have learned anything from it. That includes both players and the front office.

Monday morning, Santa Clara County’s district attorney announced that there was “insufficient evidence” to prosecute McDonald, the 49ers’ defensive lineman who was initially charged with domestic violence in the wee hours of his Labor Day weekend birthday party.

As in so many such cases, the alleged victim declined to participate in the prosecution or even have pictures taken of her injuries. Plus, there were other complicating factors — especially those involving a San Jose police officer who was called to the scene personally by McDonald because of a possible friendship between the two men.

Bottom line: We will never know what precisely happened that morning at McDonald’s house and on his lawn.
But we do know that unless McDonald and his teammates are complete idiots or complete louts, they should be paying attention and never again put themselves in such a situation.

This principle certainly extends to Aldon Smith, the defensive end who pled “no contest” in May to his charges on weapons and driving-under-the-influence. Smith’s nine-game suspension by the NFL ends this week. He could play Sunday against the New York Giants.

Here is something that has struck me: Both the McDonald incident and the Aldon Smith incident – which involved him possessing illegal assault weapons and firing a pistol at his residence – took place either during or after large parties at the homes of those players. Alcohol was consumed. Folks got rowdy. Neighbors called to complain. Things got out of control. Trouble ensued.

You might think, therefore, that the 49ers would take strong steps to discourage players from holding such parties. Monday, I asked coach Jim Harbaugh if that would be a proper move for a professional football coach to take.

Well, it seems that the head coach – if not the front office — could address the issue, if such parties were causing so many problems. That’s what I meant.

“As an organization and as a coach, I think it is proper to advise, to educate,” Harbaugh said. “I think we do that as a team. I think we continue to look for ways to send the message of good conduct. And you strive for 100 percent good conduct. And we want to have that. We haven’t had that. We want to get there. So your suggestion of ways to inform, to educate, is something that we take very seriously.”

I wrote down those words carefully. Harbaugh is striving for 100 percent good conduct by his men. We should keep a scoreboard, moving ahead.

In an ideal world, professional football players would not need to be “educated” or “advised” about how to avoid off-field violence or stupidity. They would comprehend this on their own, through common sense and human decency. But as has been demonstrated, too many NFL players have comprehension problems.

Maybe that comprehension will improve after those same players see how the Ray Rice and Adrian Petersen cases have played out – as well as the McDonald case, even if it involved no ultimate charges. McDonald could not have had an easy few months, wondering if his actions might result in charges and knowing the whole thing could have been avoided if he had chosen not to engage his fiancé in the confrontation she may have initiated.

The district attorney’s report outlines the confusion that occurred at McDonald’s home early that August morning, including the seemingly jealous rage of his fiancée regarding other women who were talking with McDonald, plus his rant about the fiancée being an unfit mother and threats to take their baby away from her. You can read all the tawdry details in the DA’s seven page memo here.

Meanwhile, what should the 49ers front office executives have learned from all this? Mostly, to handle players’ arrests with more transparency. In the wake of McDonald’s legal troubles, the 49ers rapidly declared that they were not going to suspend him because they wanted “due process” to play out.

This made for a nice sound bite and allowed Harbaugh (and others) to posture on supposed moral high ground. However, the truth was that within hours of McDonald’s arrest, general manager Trent Baalke and owner Jed York had received information about the case from the San Jose police officers they employed on an off-duty, part-time basis for team security. The 49ers also had spoken to their own players familiar with McDonald’s situation.

Based on these discussions, the 49ers believed McDonald’s story about the incident and decided that he had committed no crime. Thus, there was no reason to suspend him. But that isn’t what the 49ers said. They hid behind the “due process” smokescreen. They weren’t telling any lies. They just weren’t being completely forthright.

A better idea? The 49ers could have sat down McDonald for one game to show they took the arrest seriously while giving him time to contemplate his situation and clear his head, then announce that the team had conducted its own investigation and would keep him in uniform while supporting him, unless the DA’s probe proved otherwise.

Of course, back in early September, standing so completely behind a player in a domestic violence arrest would have taken a lot of guts. Ray Rice’s case was blowing up in the national media and the NFL was stumbling and mishandling so many elements of that story. But being upfront and candid about the McDonald situation would have enlightened the public about the organization’s true thought process, rather than making everybody read tea leaves and guess what the motivations were.

Harbaugh, you won’t be surprised to learn, was definitely standing behind McDonald on Monday when the DA’s decision was announced.

“I’ve known Ray,” Harbaugh said. “In my interactions with him, he’s told me the truth. I really felt from the very beginning that if this was something that Ray was telling the truth – and again, we weren’t there, none of us were there – then, yes, he could be strong. He could be courageous. He could live his life, do his job to the best of his ability. If you’re not telling the truth, then I think that would be an unbearable weight, for what it’s worth.”

Yes, truth is helpful. It should be endorsed. If the 49ers have learned that lesson, 100 percent stridently, then the McDonald case may have served a beneficial purpose.